October 4, 1831.

Electoral Pledges Unconstitutional.

It is on the ground of the dissolution, and of the Speech from the Throne,[14] that I charge the noble Lords with having excited the spirit which existed in the country at the period of the last general election; and with having been the cause of the unconstitutional practice, hitherto unknown, of electing delegates for a particular purpose to Parliament—­delegates to obey the daily instructions of their constituents, and to be cashiered if they should disobey them, whatever may be their own opinion; instead of being, as they have been hitherto, independent members of Parliament, to deliberate with their colleagues upon matters of common concern, and to decide according to the best of their judgment, after such deliberation and debate.  This is an evil of which the country will long feel the consequences, whatever may be the result of these discussions.

[Footnote 14:  The Whig ministry dissolved the Parliament in April, 1831.  A new Parliament met in June; and, on the 21st of that month, the King made the speech alluded to.  In the interval there had been great excitement in the country.]

My Lords, this measure, thus delegated by the people, and thus brought forward by the Government in Parliament, for the decision of members thus delegated to give it the force of a law, alters every thing; and requires, as the noble Secretary of State (Lord Melbourne) says, new powers, in order to render it practicable to carry on the Government at all.

October 4, 1831.

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A Democratic Assembly of the worst description will be elected under the Reform Bill.

Throughout the whole of the empire, persons of the lowest condition of life, liable to, and even existing under, the most pernicious influences, are to have votes; or, in other words, are to exercise political power.  Persons in those stations of life do exercise political power already; but, in a few places, in large masses; preponderating over the influence of other classes of society.  What must we expect when these lower classes will preponderate everywhere?  We know what sort of representatives are returned by the places I have described.  What are we to expect, when the whole will be of the same description?

We hear, sometimes, of radical reform; and we know that the term applies to universal suffrage, vote by ballot, annual parliaments, and their consequences.  But, I declare, that looking at these changes pervading every part of the representation, root and branch, destroying or changing everything that has existed, even to the relative numbers of the representatives from the three kingdoms fixed by treaty, I should call this a radical reform, rather than reform of any other description.

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I cannot but consider that the House of Commons returned by it will be a democratical assembly of the worst description; that radical reform, vote by ballot, and all the evil consequences to be expected from the deliberations of such an assembly, must follow from this establishment.  I entreat your Lordships to pause before you agree to establish such a system in your country.